Since 2013 the consideration of psychological risk assessment, as required by occupational health and safety, has been mandatory. ‘Companies and organisations of all sizes must identify the risks to their employees arising from mental stress at work’. In larger companies, risk assessment is often carried out by occupational health and safety officers, but for start-ups and smaller companies this is an additional expense, where CompanyMood can facilitate and supplement risk assessment with continuous feedback.
How companies proceed to identify psychological stress factors
Psychological stress at work can be caused by a variety of different influences, such as work intensity, team interaction, working hours or spatial factors such as a noisy environment, poor lighting and an unpleasant climate. Moderate stress at work is acceptable and normal. If however the stress shows signs of negative effects on the health of employees, appropriate steps should be taken to improve the respective activities or circumstances.
Regular surveys and workshops are recommended in which the burdens are recorded and solutions are found. The EU-OSHA portal provides detailed information and recommendations for action. It is worth taking a look at their pages and the section on risk assessment of mental stress.
The following steps must be carried out
- Definition of activities and areas
- Determination of the mental workload through surveys and workshops
- Assessment of the psychological stress of work
- Development and implementation of measures
- Monitoring the effectiveness of the measures applied
- Updating and documentation of the risk assessment
The implementation and observance of the steps above are associated with a high expenditure of time and are taken over by the management or the personnel management, particularly in small and medium-sized enterprises without occupational safety specialists.
How can HR and management with their already tight schedules cope with this additional requirement?
Surveys of mental stress
CompanyMood helps employees and managers to identify psychological stress and to derive appropriate measures. For an initial overview, CompanyMood uses a screening questionnaire to identify possible job-related, stressful work factors. Based on this, further methods such as workshops or interviews can contribute in more detail to the survey.
Continuously record, analyse and document hazards
CompanyMood relieves occupational health and safety professionals and human resources managers of much of the work involved in assessing the risk of psychological stress. The development of measures and workshops remains the responsibility of the companies, as these vary greatly according to industry and activity. CompanyMood makes a decisive contribution to reducing the effort required and to automatically implement the required analysis, performance review and documentation. If CompanyMood is used with the standard set of our topics, all required areas for efficient recording and documentation are available.
The topics and their evaluation are marked over time and changes (documented by event pins) can be recorded and their effects made visible. The created measures and the results are also documented. This is done weekly in a PDF report, which is sent directly to those responsible.
Productivity and motivation decrease due to psychological stress
Psychological stress reduces the productivity and motivation of employees. The best examples of such stress factors are disturbing conversations among colleagues, loud noises or an uncomfortable working atmosphere. In order to keep potential psychological, physical or health consequences as low as possible, the early detection and analysis of stressful, job-related factors is an important prerequisite for prevention. Even small changes are the first step in the right direction.
How does your company fulfil the legal obligation to assess the risk of psychological stress?
Read our PDF here: Psychosocial-Risks-at-Work-CompanyMood.
We are looking forward to your feedback or comments.
You would like to test CompanyMood with all its functions for 30 days free of charge? Then register now.
Orlando Policicchio ist Geschäftsführer und Mitgründer von CompanyMood. Als Führungskraft und Projektmanager hat er schon früh Erfahrungen mit der Wichtigkeit von Mitarbeiterfeedback und einer gelebten Firmenkultur sammeln.
